The area affected by the Mississippi flood of 1927, the most severe in US history, is unrivaled in the annals of American “natural” disasters. By Peter Coates.

After the Exxon Valdez oil spill, Exxon launched a ruthless crusade to intimidate and discredit government scientists. By Sarah Emerson.

This isn’t a cold war; it’s a hot war. And experts caution that the conflict in Eastern Ukraine could soon get a whole lot hotter if fighting damages huge industrial storage units of chlorine gas and there is a deadly release of the toxic gas. “If one of those uncontrolled sites containing chemicals were to detonate, tens of thousands of people could be poisoned. It is a potential disaster on the scale of Chernobyl,” Robert Amsterdam, Russian political expert and lawyer at international law firm Amsterdam & Partners, told Fox News.

Beyonce

Radiation expert Andrew Karam, who covered the disaster for Popular Mechanics in 2011 and later traveled to study the site, explains everything you need to know about Fukushima's legacy and danger five years later.​

On the eve of the Civil War, a nightmare at sea turned into one of the greatest rescues in maritime history. More than a century later, a rookie treasure hunter went looking for the lost ship—and found a different kind of ruin. By David Wolman.

Officials are struggling to clear towns of toxic animals so that people displaced after the 2011 nuclear meltdown can come back. By Kimiko de Freytas-Tamura.

At least one person has been killed and about 20 injured when a train carriage fell on to its side following a derailment close to the Belgian capital Brussels, railway officials say. The accident happened as the train was departing Leuven station at a slow speed heading towards the capital. Emergency services were quick to arrive at the scene of the crash, which happened at 12:20 GMT on Saturday.

An explosion has erupted at EDF’s Flamanville nuclear power plant in northern France. At least five people suffered light injuries in the blast. EDF has confirmed that one reactor has been taken offline adding there is no nuclear risk. “It is a significant technical event, but it’s not a nuclear accident,” a representative of the local prefecture said, adding that the accident occurred outside of the ‘nuclear zone’.

Tens of firefighters were inside as the 17-storey structure fell to the ground in a matter seconds.

Rescuers in central Italy say many people have been killed after a hotel was hit by an avalanche.

These infamous clams are invading new areas, buoyed by climate change and the 2011 tsunami in Japan. By Sarah Gilman.

The animals died in their hundreds of thousands in the space of a fortnight. Now scientists are trying to find out what happened. By E.J. Miller-Gulnand, Eric Morgan and Richard Kock.

Ice loss could be happening much faster than previously thought. By Laurel Kornfeld.

The ill-fated ship had left the Bethlehem Steel Corp. in Lackawanna, heading toward Minnesota to pick up some iron ore when it ran into a horrific storm packing winds exceeding 65 mph and creating 30-foot waves on frigid Lake Huron… By Gene Warner.

We think of outer space as distant and unreachable, but in fact events out in the cosmos may have helped and hindered the evolution of life on Earth. By Philip Ball.

Totally no need to worry or anything though. By Daniel Oberhaus.

A new study, published in the journal Science on Friday morning, says climate change is already affecting every aspect of life on Earth. Professor David Dudgeon speaks to RTHK’s Richard Pyne. [We’re all most definitely going to die from climate shock within thirty years, it’s just not going to be on the news until right beforehand.]

It’s been more than two months since Typhoon Lionrock dumped nearly eight inches of rain on North Korea in three days, triggering a catastrophic flood along the border with China that killed at least 138 people and left another 400 missing. And now, with sub-zero winter temperatures looming, the situation is perhaps even more dire than in the flood’s immediate aftermath.

“Patsy turned to Biggi and mentioned that they seemed to be going faster than usual. Suddenly, Walsh spotted a set of metal gates blocking the road 30 feet away. For an instant, he froze, then he grabbed the brake handle with his right hand, yanking so hard it bent...” By Eric Moskowitz.